I guess his growth plates are still open. He grew 2" in one paragraph!
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Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread (April 2017)
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Lol'd
Well that adds a lot to the discussion. Care to elaborate?
EfremWinters84
- S. Carolina
Wow, a big with actual inside moves. A little Ian Happ, perhaps? And if he's good enough for Xavier, he's good enough for me.
I love the thought of DJ on this team. Do you think he is waiting to see what Mark Smith does or who else we bring in before he makes up his mind?
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The issue with DJ is that coaches and fans have been projecting how good he might be since he was a sophomore in high school. Heck, Robert Smith benched him all the time even when he was a senior and signed with Illinois. Then at Illinois, he has show very short flashes but it goes away quickly. Upping a player's motor is not that easy, and so far, high school and college coaches have not been able to accomplish it with DJ.
If he stays on the team, I would have very low expectations and be pleasantly surprised if he contributed positive minutes.
I think DJ will be here as long as he put the effort in during practice, BU doesn't seem to be a coach who lets guys be lazy. So we will see if the reason for him not seeing the court much ,do to his lack of effort in practice was true or not
Which is somewhat mind boggling looking back at his offer list coming out of high school:
Illinois
Florida
DePaul
Purdue
Georgetown
Tennessee
But I do agree, bad habits are hard to break, and he has definitely formed some over the last two or three years.
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Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
I think you're partially right, but it's probably also because once he makes a bad play he gets down on himself and gets lazy. Which I'm assuming he would do in practice also so coach knew what was coming and would pull him out.
EDIT: also a 100% #hottake
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I think you're partially right, but it's probably also because once he makes a bad play he gets down on himself and gets lazy. Which I'm assuming he would do in practice also so coach knew what was coming and would pull him out.
EDIT: also a 100% #hottake
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ivwilsoniv
- Aurora, IL
I'm pretty sure he meant "Ethan Happ," but can't blame him for having the World Champs on his mind.
TownieMatt
CU Expat
- Chicago
Agree 100% that it's mental with him. He has all the tools (except maybe a great outside shot), to be a quality B1G level player, but he tends to get in a funk. I don't think it's laziness though, he just becomes to passive and hesitant if things aren't going his way. I think that's why Rob Smith would pull him in and out of games at Simeon, trying to get him to snap out of it.
It actually reminds be a lot of Mav. We all remember how timid Mav looked on the court his first three years. Luckily he was able to flip a switch last year, but that doesn't happen for everyone.
Unfortunately being passive and hesitant looks the same as lazy when it comes to basketball. Especially from a coaches perspective.
I would love to see DJ have a similar turnaround that Mav did, of course we all would.
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TownieMatt
CU Expat
- Chicago
It might look the same, but a good coach knows if the cause is laziness or a lack of confidence. A good coach also knows that there's a big difference in the way you go about fixing those two issues.
Thus, the reason Groce couldn't get the best out of him, and the reason I think BU can.
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One thing I noticed during the video that was posted. He never used his left hand to finish around the rim. All of his post moves, he goes over his left shoulder finishing with a right handed hook. I hope he can go left or teams will just sit on his left shoulder making his moves ineffective.
While not necessarily disagreeing with your view as to DJ, it applies more to AJ IMO. DJ got some regular game action for awhile before the falling out occurred. The guy who never got in much at all, and when he did was yanked nearly immediately, was AJ. And despite that AJ never sulked, failed to hustle, or lost focus when he did get in. I'm hoping he gets a better chance to play under BU.
I think the transfer from Iowa St. was related to an injury.
http://www.cyclones.com/news/2016/5/9/210942387.aspx
Decommittment from Xavier was due to them taking Kanter.
Illiniwek06
- N of I-80
Xavier and Iowa State >>>> Northern Iowa and Eastern Illinois.
http://www.ny2lasports.com/article_one.aspx?articleid=3748
http://www.scout.com/college/iowa-state/story/1558356-brady-ernst-commits-to-iowa-state
Narrative are just that, similar school set. Interestingly...he was recruited at none other than Stephen F Austin in 2015, who was there again?
Illiniwek06
- N of I-80
http://www.ny2lasports.com/article_one.aspx?articleid=3748
http://www.scout.com/college/iowa-state/story/1558356-brady-ernst-commits-to-iowa-state
Narrative are just that, similar school set. Interestingly...he was recruited at none other than Stephen F Austin in 2015, who was there again?
Huh? The narrative of one guy committing to Iowa State and Xavier is not at all similar to a guy with offers from Eastern Illinois, Northern Iowa, and Illinois State. And that's great that SFA recruited Bruninga in 2015. Maybe it's because SFA doesn't attract the talent that UI does?
Illiniwek06
- N of I-80
I don't understand what your point is then? Are you talking up Bruninga or Ernst? Because I'm totally happy with Ernst. Not so much with Bruninga.
Edit: From your original post I responded to, I thought you were saying Ernst and Bruninga are similar because you said "same type of schools recruited him originally as 'Bruninga'" - my point was that, I feel Ernst is much better because of his offers/commitments versus Bruninga's offers.
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I'm not sure he ever saw enough playing time to say his flashes go away quickly. I'm not saying he deserved more time, just as a fan didn't see enough to really make that statement.
The thing I don't like about us speculating on DJ getting more playing time is that we have no idea what he did in practice. It's very possible that he would give up easily and the coaching staff wanted to try and get rid of that sort of attitude.
I would say the same about AJ, but everything I have ever heard about him suggests otherwise.
I would say the same about AJ, but everything I have ever heard about him suggests otherwise.
Illiniwek06
- N of I-80
If Bruninga gets an offer and ends up at UI, I'll support him. Sitting here today, I would not be pleased if we end up with Bruninga when we had, say, Pickett committed already.
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